40 hours of mandatory training for public administration: How to use them for GIS
Starting in 2025, every public employee must complete at least 40 hours of training per year. If you work in a technical office, urban planning, or public works, those hours are the opportunity to close the gap that slows you down every day: learning to independently read and produce your Municipality's territorial data, without relying on external consultants for every request. Here you'll find exactly what the obligation entails, why GIS training fits perfectly, and where to start.
What the 40-hour obligation requires
The reference is the Directive by the Minister for Public Administration of January 16, 2025, which sets the annual per capita training hours — starting in 2025 — at no fewer than 40, equivalent to one week of training per year. It's not a suggestion: achieving this target becomes a specific performance goal for each manager, and thus enters into their evaluation. You can read the analysis of the directive and its relationship with institutional autonomy on Publika and an overview on Lentepubblica.
On the contractual front, the CCNL Funzioni Locali of November 16, 2022 regulates staff training inArticle 55 and establishes a point that changes everything in practice: training hours are considered actual working hours. You don't do them in the evening, you don't do them on vacation.
A useful clarification, because it causes confusion: the hours are annual, not triennial. Forty hours every year, for each employee.
Why GIS fully falls under mandatory training
Administrations don't choose content at random: the reference framework is the Syllabus "Digital Skills for PA", which describes the minimum set of knowledge to actively participate in digital transformation. The Syllabus is organized into five thematic areas — includingdata and document usage — each at three mastery levels: basic, intermediate, and advanced. Find the official training offer on the Syllabus portal.
Territorial data management — opening, verifying, querying, and publishing cartography — falls precisely under the data area. And it has an advantage few training contents have: it immediately translates into work done. A technician who, after a course, knows how to connect their QGIS to regional WMS services stops requesting map extracts from third parties the very next day.
Where to start: two concrete paths
The key distinction isn't between software, but between knowing how to read data and knowing how to make it work.
- For absolute beginners the need is to quickly achieve a visible result: opening data they already have, connecting to official maps, producing a printable layout. This is the goal of Basic QGIS Course: four hours live, from installation to finished PDF.
- For existing QGIS users they usually waste time on the same manual repetitive tasks. The Advanced QGIS Course works with PostGIS databases, spatial analysis, data quality control, and automated procedures that run independently on hundreds of elements.
- For those needing to make data accessible to all departments — or to citizens — the WebGIS Course represents the transition from file-based maps to online maps.
QGIS is free software: no licenses to purchase, no additional budget items beyond the training itself.
How to align hours with the organization's training plan
Three practical tips from experience with municipal projects:
- Plan by department, not by individual. Training two technicians from the same technical department is more valuable than training one per area: skills remain even when someone is on leave.
- Use the organization's real data during training. Practicing with your municipality's street database, rather than a sample dataset, means leaving the classroom with work already started.
- Account for hours, not just courses. The 40 hours comprise multiple initiatives: a 4 to 12-hour GIS course covers a significant and verifiable portion.
Want a dedicated edition for your entity?
We’ll tailor the program to your territory’s real data — road networks, house numbers, green areas, toponymy, signage — so training hours also yield operational results. We’ve already conducted training activities for the Municipality of San Gimignano, the Municipality of Casalecchio di Reno and theOrder of Architects of Florence.
Request the program for your entity.
Frequently asked questions
Are the 40 hours annual or triennial?
Annual. The January 16, 2025 directive sets a minimum of annual 40 hours per capita starting from 2025.
Are training hours considered working hours?
Yes. The CCNL Funzioni Locali of November 16, 2022, in Article 55, considers training activities as actual working hours.
Does a QGIS course count toward the mandatory requirement?
Training on territorial data falls under the "data and documents" area of the PA Digital Skills Syllabus. Planning ultimately remains with each administration, which assesses alignment with its own needs.
Do I need to purchase software licenses?
No. QGIS is free and open-source software, usable without limitations even on public workstations.
